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Once Ellie cuts Abby down from the pillar, Abby staggers to another pillar and gestures to Ellie to cut another person’s ropes down.
Ellie does it wordlessly but not without glaring at Abby while she holds her profusely bleeding side. It’s then when Abby starts to lead Ellie to the boats. Ellie follows quietly, staggering as she does. The amount of blood she lost is starting to get to her.
Once she reaches the boats, she grasps onto it so she doesn’t fall into the water and drown. She suddenly remembers once asking Joel when he had a fatal wound if he could walk. He said “ Yes .” and Ellie had said “ Well then fucking walk! ”
She wants to laugh but Ellie’s bones just ache when she thinks about Joel and how much she fucking misses him and how much she regrets pushing him away. She really did love him, but he just fucked up her whole perception of love. She left Dina and JJ behind for this.
And the thing is that she was happy being around him. Even when she was second guessing everything he told her, she still enjoyed his company. Him teaching her to play guitar, telling jokes, talking about their sad little love lives together.
When she was 17, it all turned to shit. It took Ellie going down to the St. Mary’s Hospital herself to force the truth out of Joel. Ellie thought she could trust Joel, she did at one point of her life.
She tried to give her trust back to Joel just a little too late. No matter how many times Tommy or Maria told her to just talk to Joel. It was a little too late.
Sure, she gave Joel a promise of forgiveness but what does it matter if he’s fucking dead? If she wants to talk to him, she has to talk to a freshly dug grave and headstone that says Joel Miller ?
She finally has Abby within her grasp, she’s right there. She killed everyone else that was there to witness Joel’s death and all that’s left is Abby, and while Ellie is grasping the boat, all she think about is how she begged Abby not to kill Joel, watching Abby’s friend spit on him and said “Rest in hell, asshole.”
All because of Ellie.
She remembers how Joel took her to that museum for her birthday and showed her actual dinosaur bones and took her to space. Ellie tears up just thinking about it. How clueless she had been to Joel’s love towards her, how much he did for her.
“I can’t let you go.” Ellie finally says, pushing away from the boat and towards Abby.
“I’m not doing this.” Abby replies, still working on untying the knot that’s anchoring her boat that she has her little boy companion in.
“Look at me!” Ellie yells, stumbling towards Abby. Ellie’s panting, biting down on her bottom lip to stop her sobs of pain.
Abby stops what she’s doing and turns to look at Ellie. It’s the first time Ellie really looks at Abby. Her hair is short, she looks malnourished, she has rope burns on her wrists, and her face looks gaunt.
“You took him from me.” Ellie cries, stepping up to Abby. “He was mine but you took him from me.” And Ellie knows it mirrors what she has said to Joel the night she promised her forgiveness, the night they decided they could maybe just be Joel and Ellie again.
“He killed my father.” Abby says, but her voice is hoarse and deep from disuse. “The only person I cared about, the only family I had left. He killed my father for you .”
“Joel was my family too! You had a father. I never met my mother, I never even knew who my father was. Joel was all I had.” Ellie yells selfishly. Joel was selfish too, maybe that’s who she gets it from. She clenches her fist before pointing her finger at Abby. “You should’ve killed me! I was the one you wanted. I was the reason your father died. I was the cure.”
Abby scoffs at that. “My dad was the one who wanted you. I could’ve cared less about you. My dad wanted a fantasy. He put so much hope in you that it’s fucking disappointing seeing you now.” Abby leans against her boat with sad smirk on her face. “You came all this way for what? To kill me?”
Joel laying bloodied on the floor; his face swollen, blood running down his face and Ellie begging him to get up, to fucking get up suddenly flashes in Ellie’s mind.
“He was mine. I just—“ Ellie sobs, using her free hand to wipe her tears away. “I never forgave him for what he did. He lied to me for years about what he did to the Fireflies. I’m sorry .”
Ellie’s starting to feel delirious now and again she remembers when Joel fell down on that rebar. It makes her even more sad. She wishes he could be here to tell her how to deal with this, the problem he caused.
“He was my dad and I’m sorry he did this and I know I can’t make it right.” Ellie says as she stumbles, pressing her hand against her wound as hard as she can. “I fucking wish he was here so we can just talk. I’m sorry and I know Joel would be sorry too. He did it for me. He.. he loved me so much he had to go against the greater good and I know that doesn’t make it right, but I know if there was some way to make it right, he would do it.”
Ellie gives Abby a nod before staggering back to her boat. Abby just watches her curiously, leaning back against her own boat.
“He loved you that much to fuck the whole world of a cure?” Abby asks incredulously.
“I guess so.” Ellie replies as she clambers into her boat.